Had lunch there the other day -- solid decor, solid Pad Thai and I already know (from the Corner Store) they can make a nice curry...hope the place does well -- the folks who own it are very nice. I expect that this will be one of the better Thai places in town, once they get into their groove.

Yesterday I got home from work, feeling crappy and run down - all I wanted to do was order some Tom Yum from Lao Laan Xiang and crawl into bed.

That's when I made a horrifying discovery - LLX no longer delivers.

I cursed inwardly, but there just wasn't anything for it - if I wanted delicious, healing ginger and lemon-grass infused soup, I was going to have to leave the house.

So - I decided to finally give Sala Thai a try. Right off the bat I saw I was in luck - they've got Tom Yum on the menu too! I got that and a hot thread noodle salad; both were delish (although I do think I prefer LLX's Tom Yum), and without ordering alcohol my total bill (generous tip included) came to $15.00 - not bad for the amount of food I knocked back.

Second: what th----???!Both locations, the whole paradisical paradigm?
Or just the Atwood store?
I don't mean to thread jump but holy hot citrus, Marvell, you can't just casually drop a rice bomb in the middle of another restaurant's thread and then walk out of the room!!!

Sounds like they need to be introduced to the age-old concept of an 86 list Ã¢â‚¬â€œ and to informing their customers of it the moment they are seated (or whenever it is they first see the menu). To gloss over this doesn't serve Isthmus readers and, worse, is a disservice to competing restaurants that are more well run.

Even if they're just serving chee' burgers with orange-colored dairy product, it's good to know straight off the bat what they have and what they don't. It's a matter of not only of minimal competence but also basic honesty. In the same vein, if a restaurant can't reasonably estimate a time-until-seating, it should just be honest about it and let the customer make her or his decision, based on the circumstances. "We estimate 20 minutes, but can only guarantee 45 minutes, based on our experience." Or even, "We have no f*cking clue, but the food is good!"

"A smart diner will be prepared to wait" Ã¢â‚¬â€œ as long as it's clear just how long that wait might be.

If Sala Thai was misleading potential patrons as to the estimated wait, I would have mentioned it. It would be reasonable to assume that "be prepared to wait" means "be prepared to wait the amount of time they told you you'd need to wait for a table." That's pretty much the understood baseline MO for any dining establishment, isn't it?

Never heard the term "86 list" before. But as a young restaurant (even a popular one), I could understand Sala Thai not wanting to begin each diner's evening by telling them what they can't order. Maybe as they establish themselves a bit more, they can consider such a list and not be too worried about people being turned off by a perceived lack of offerings.

Bottom line is that these issues -- part of the "growing pains" I mention in the subtitle -- are not sufficient to detract meaningfully from the experience.

I thought it was meh. I had takeout Pad Thai and an appetizer sampler. The apps were good and included very large and crispy crab rangoons, fresh fishcakes, meaty dumplings and a typical eggroll. The Pad Thai (supposedly with chicken) was not as good. Very little chicken and it wasn't as tasty as Pad Thai can be. May try it again, but the so-so food coupled with the way too long wait (20 minutes promised that turned to 35 with only 3 customers in the joint), suggests not. Sa-Bai Thong keeps pulling me back.

Ate there last night. We didn't have to wait at 6:30 on a Thursday night. Waitress was prompt and attentive. Low point was the spring roll. The wrapper was dry and tough, and it was swimming in a sauce we found a bit too strong on fresh ginger - won't have that again. The "potsticker" appeared to have been deep-fried. It was tasty but not a traditional potsticker and well, I guess that's what we get for ordering a Chinese item at a Thai restaurant? We had the egg rolls, and those were good - 4 small ones, tasty filling, crispy, not greasy. But the real star was my entree - stuffed chicken wings in a sauce. IT WAS AWESOME - ORDER THIS IF YOU GO!!!! - I would lick that sauce off just about anything (something that generated some interest from my spousal unit.....). We also had Pad Thai, thought it was very good too, (but not as good as I make it home with the recipe from Cooks Illustrated - but then no restaurant version is). Can't wait to try other stuff.

We finally tried Sala Thai Saturday night. We had two orders of crab rangoon, Pad Thai, Peanut Chicken, Thai Iced Tea, and one Fat Squirrel. The goons were YUMMY! One of the best in town. I am partial to LLX crab rangoon, but there really isn't much difference between the two. My pad thai was really good. The peanut chicken was okay, but too spicy. It only had one pepper by the name, so we assumed it would be "just enough" spicy. My husband thought there could have been more chicken in the dish as well. The Thai iced tea was awesome! It's like crack in a glass. The best thing about it is that they serve it in a big glass. So you really get your money's worth. About the time you would normally think: "oh dang, I have to start rationing my sips, it's almost gone", you have another half a glass left! The service was okay. It was not as bad as some of the other experience's I've read about here. It was not terrible service by any means. It just wasn't prompt. We were there about an hour and it really wasn't that busy. The prices were reasonable, our bill was around $29. We will definitely go back.